"What's good for Kolaloka is good for the law!" says one of the characters, and by the end of the film both villains and heroes learn to work together for the sake of business – i.e. the Kolaloka company, whose name is obviously based on Coca-Cola. As the film progresses, it becomes clearer that Joe doesn't just clean up the town for morality's sake, but because he wants whiskey out of the way.

One of the subplots involves the arrival of an evangelist in the town, with his daughter. Although the evangelist doesn't seem to be working purely for financial motives, he is both contrasted and likened to Joe in his techniques.

The film's main theme is the continuing controversy of interconnection of big business and government in society. While some would see this as necessary, and good, others think the opposite, hence the film's opinions on large scale American marketing campaigns, such as Coca Cola's, are embodied in Joe's ambiguity as a character... is he an all American hero, or just a shameless shill and coward? Likewise Joe's love interests are torn between the dark haired beauty who works in the bawdy-house, and the clean-living blonde evangelist's daughter. Initially he is more interested in the latter, especially as she is involved in a temperance campaign which would be good for his Kolaloka franchise business.

Brdečka's Lemonade Joe short stories were written for magazines in the early 1940s. They were adapted as a stage play in 1946 and inspired the 1949 puppet film The Song of the Prairie, where the theme song appeared for the first time. Brdečka's experience as an animator made for several effects and ideas derived from animation being incorporated into the film.